Thanks for sticking with this! I'm sorry it's late. I had a little trouble with our girl Tina. Not to worry, Finn and Rachel are already under construction. Again, reviews are always, always appreciated. xx

Tina

Will sighed and tried not to roll his eyes when Rachel accused him, yet again, of ruining her career. She was a sophomore in high school. Will wasn't sure exactly what "career" she was talking about, but apparently his decision to deny her the role of Maria was catastrophic on every level.

"That was great, Tina. Good job." He clapped his hands.

"You don't have to say that. I was ssssharp. I ccccan't do this."

"Hey, hey look at me. Have you noticed the more confident you are, the less you stutter?"

She shared a smile with him.

"I need you to be great at regionals. To do that, you've got to know that you can do this."

And you can do this. I know you can.

Tina backed away from his grasp. "You have to give this song to Rachel."

Will's heart sunk as he watched her walk away from him, blue hair swaying back and forth.

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Will smiled as he walked down the hallway. His kids performed wonderfully in wheelchairs, no one broke a bone, and the school was getting new handicap ramps. He stopped by the choir room and flicked the lights off, frowning. He could have sworn that he had already done that, but he shrugged and was about to move on when a noise drew his attention to the back corner.

"Hello?" Will stepped into the room.

He was answered with what clearly was a hiccup followed by a sniffle.

"Hello?" He climbed up the steps and looked down into the space between the risers and the wall.

"Tina."

She looked up at him, biting her lower lip, as eye makeup marred her face.

"Tina, what happened?"

She shook her head and dropped her face back into her knees, hiccupping again. Will jumped from the tallest riser, sat on the floor, and pulled his knees into his chest, mirroring her.

"You can talk to me, you know. That's why I'm here." Again she remained silent save for the occasional sniffle. "And if you don't feel comfortable talking to me, there's always Miss Pillsbury."

"I can't talk to Miss Pillsbury. She always thinks I'm going to get eyeliner on her chair… or something like that."

Will couldn't help but crack a smile. "Yes, well, I think we both know that Miss Pillsbury doesn't handle germs very well." His eyes went wide as he realized how that could be misconstrued. "Not that you have germs, I mean. I'm sure you're very clean." Nice, Schuester.

He cleared his throat. "Is it the wheelchair number?"

At the mention of wheelchairs, Tina burst out sobbing, causing Will to jump.

"Whoa, whoa. I didn't mean anything by…." He trailed off and hesitantly placed a hand on her shoulder. He didn't know Tina well – not as well as Rachel or Finn or even Kurt at this point. It was a fact he wasn't proud about.

"Look, I know Tina Turner isn't everyone's cup of tea, but we can work around it."

Hiccup. "It's not the number."

"Then… what – ?" Will paused mid-question, a sudden realization hitting him. "Tina, you haven't stuttered at all in the last five minutes."

She froze, her face turning ashen.

"I forget when I'm upset."

"You forget to what?"

Tina inhaled deeply and finally met his eyes. "Stutter."

Will leaned back, mouth hanging slightly open. "You mean it's…"

"Fake. Yeah." The blush that graced her face bloomed furiously.

Will closed his mouth and leaned forward. "But why?"

"I don't like speaking."

"You're doin' fine so far." Will held up his hand and pulled Tina off the floor, depositing her on one of the risers.

"Well, I don't have a problem speaking to you."

Will smirked. "Really? Because you don't do it all that often."

Tina merely shrugged. "It's a public thing."

Will sat down beside her. "Does anyone know?"

Tina's lower lip trembled at the question. "Artie knows."

"I guess he didn't take it very well." It wasn't a question.

She shook her head. "No. No he didn't."

Will had seen the way they looked at each other. The "longing from afar" look was one he knew well. They remained silent for a few more moments.

"It's all right if you don't understand, Mr. Schue. My own parents don't get it."

Will sighed. He might not understand the eyeliner or the dyed hair or the fishnet gloves, but he understood the feeling of helplessness. No matter how hard you try, or how badly you want it, you just can't change how terrifying being vulnerable is.

He cleared his throat. "You know, when I was younger… four or five, I think… my grandfather would constantly ask me questions, quiz me. I think he liked to see how much I knew, how many things I could remember. It was his way of bonding before I was old enough to throw a baseball… Well, I would get so flustered that I would stutter. Then I would get frustrated when I stuttered and eventually I stopped speaking altogether."

Tina's eyebrows shot up. "Really?"

"Yep. My parents even sent me to therapy for it. Then, once I was cured, they couldn't get me to shut up. I was singing Sondheim all over the house."

A laugh escaped before Tina sobered up. "My parents sent me to therapy, too."

"Well, look at that." He playfully nudged her shoulder with his. "I guess we do have something in common."

"Please don't tell anyone else."

"I won't," he promised. "In the meantime, I want you to do me a favor."

Tina sniffed and wiped her eyes, smearing mascara on the back of her hand. "Of course."

"I want you to work on something."

Tina's eager attitude dissolved and she immediately became apprehensive.

"Relax, I'm not asking you to give the State of the Union," he said as he rummaged around in his bag. "Here."

He handed her a photocopied excerpt from Pygmalion. "It's my students' homework." Tina looked at him questioningly and he shrugged. "What can I say? I'm a fan of Shaw. They have to translate that into Spanish."

"Mr. Schue, are you expecting me to learn Spanish?"

He laughed. "No. I want you to read this out loud."

Will visibly saw the tension settle back into her shoulders. "Now?"

"No, not now. At home, alone, in front of the mirror. You can work up to reading it to someone you trust, like Mercedes - "

"Or you."

Will felt his face flush. "Or me… Or Artie."

Tina slouched. "I don't think Artie wants to hear anything from me, Shaw or not."

Will placed a hand on her shoulder. "He'll come around. Us boys always do. Just ask Professor Higgins."

"Who?"

Will tapped the paper. "A professor of phonetics. He knows his stuff." He smiled and stood, lifting his bag over his shoulder. As he headed for the door, Will realized that he learned more about Tina in the past fifteen minutes than he had over the past fifteen weeks. He turned back around once more and saw her whispering the words on the paper to herself. He couldn't help the smile that exploded across his face.

"Tina?"

"Hm?" She glanced up.

"Don't ever think that you have to hide behind something that's not real. I know you. The confidence is in there somewhere." He chuckled, "I mean, who else would have the guts to sing 'I Kissed a Girl' complete with inappropriate hand gestures at a high school glee audition."

Tina blushed again and dipped her head. "Yeah, sorry about that."

Will laughed. "No worries. Trust me, I've seen far worse."

Will turned to go again, but Tina's voice stopped him. "Thanks for everything, Mr. Schue."

"Anytime."

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It took Tina two days to recite the lines to herself and three more before she did it in front of a mirror.

It took her one week to perform them in front of Mr. Schue and two weeks to do it without stuttering.

A day after that, she found an anthology of Shaw plays mysteriously placed in her bag during glee rehearsal.

In the midst of shedding her shell, Artie approached Tina out of the blue and offered to read Higgins's lines while she read Liza's. She suspected that the restoration of her relationship with Artie, along with the Shaw anthology, was Mr. Schuester's doing, but she never asked him.

And when McKinley High announced that the new Spring musical would be "My Fair Lady," Tina's was the first name on the audition sheet.